Wonder Woman: Agent of Peace #17 review

As opening pages go, this latest DC Digital First comic has quite the grabber.

Diana has been tasked with protecting the teenage daughter of an ARGUS agent after a hit was put out on her. Effie Ying is 16, smart and almost inevitably annoying.

Still, she doesn’t deserve a visit from these guys.

‘The Bodyguard’ is one of those tales that, in the Eighties, DC would have selected for a Year’s Best Comic Book Stories digest. Written by Andrea Shea and illustrated by Isaac Goodheart, coloured by Cris Peter and lettered by Becca Carey, it’s a highly entertaining, thought-provoking done-in-one. It’s action packed, it’s a character piece. It has things to say about love and loneliness and the modern world.

Shea’s Wonder Woman is mighty, but not without vulnerabilities. Effie is smart-mouthed, but hardly irredeemable. The bad guys are a fun combination of ridiculous and terrifying.

And wait until you see how well Shea writes Etta Candy… actually, if you read the seventh issue of WW:AoP – which I reviewed here – you’ve already seen it. Anyway, it’s more of that good stuff. If we can’t get Shea on the Wonder Woman monthly, how about an Etta mini? Hey, Steve Trevor got one, and he hasn’t got half the personality.

Isaac Goodheart’s work is good-looking, well composed, nicely finished… his characters have an expressiveness rarely seen this side of Kevin Maguire, there’s a very clever treatment of Effie and Diana entering the latter’s apartment and Goodheart gives Diana the best ride this side of the Invisible Plane.

The colours of Cris Peter – wouldn’t it be wonderful were she a relative of Wonder Woman co-creator HG Peter? – are great, naturalistic for the most part, but popping as the more explosive moments arrive. Becca Carey’s lettering is unshowy but perfectly emphasises the beats of the script.

Once again, editor Michael McCalister has shepherded a terrific DC Digital First book – I’d love to see this entire creative team moved over to the main title at some point.

So, slap down 79p, 99c or whatever, download this issue and let me know what you think – at a quarter of the price of a regular comic but with just four fewer pages, I doubt you’ll be sorry.